The Lost and Broken Man
by Lady Isaiah
Summary: They had him in their sights. And he’d told them – now begging, screaming in his mind, “Don’t kill him…don’t hurt him.” -- Nathan's hunting Peter, but what if he only ends up ends up hurting him?


**Author:** Hana Kiri  
**Summary:** They had him in their sights. And he'd told them – now begging, screaming in his mind, "Don't kill him…don't hurt him." [Nathan's hunting Peter, but what he only ends up ends up hurting him?]  
**Warnings:** Post-Cold Wars, 3x17  
**Pairings:** none  
**Character Focus: **Nathan Petrelli and Peter Petrelli  
**Disclaimer:** The TV show "Heroes" does not belong to me, nor do its characters or anything related to the show. I make no profit out of this story, it is written merely for fun and entertainment of other fans as well as experimentation in writing. All things concerning the facility and technical ideas are all assumed.  
**Part:** 1  
**Notes: ** Not quite sure if I should continue.

* * *

_All these places I have been  
All these faces I have seen  
Too much, too much  
All these bricks and all these stones  
Have all been cast they've all been thrown  
Too hard, too hard_

"**Too Much" by Leeland**

**The Lost and Broken Man**  
They had Peter in their sights, cold. And he'd told them – now begging, screaming in his mind, "Don't kill him…don't hurt him." And dear God he wished that it were Noah who had him. Noah had compassion and before he could have shot Peter dead but didn't. Noah didn't want to hurt Peter as much as Nathan would never dream it. And whenever Nathan saw Peter – the days he died and acted melodramatic, the buildings he'd fell from, those lonely nights in the hospital, the day Nathan really believed he'd left the world of the living – "Just wake up. Please wake up."

It broke his heart every time. And like Nathan said, "I don't know what I'd do without you, who I'd be without you" but a lost and broken man. But he didn't say that last bit.

Red dots danced across the ground circling each other and ignorance might think it something to play with or something to watch like some damned light show. But it felt like a game: flee the dots and they were running. Nathan couldn't tell if they were running from him or if he was the one running. It could be both. Feet operate so mechanically these days, telling him where to do, what to do, so self-assured in themselves. Then the thought occurred to him the, what happens when all this running ends? Surrender wasn't an option. They were scared, but Peter was more confused and angry than scared. Peter had never really been scared of Nathan. And now Nathan had gone and made himself the villain. Peter simply just did not understand. However Nathan had never gotten around to telling him the whole truth because he knew that Peter would never agree to it. Those damned emotions – delusions of heroism like they were meant for something more by simply saving a cheerleader. Nathan sounded cynical like Peter wasn't meant for great things, but Nathan really did believe that Peter was, but this – this wasn't it. The cheerleader held the same kind of delusions. And now she was considered family, more than just biologically anyway and now she had a right to be angry but Nathan didn't really explain anything to her like he hadn't really explained anything at all. It would be safer (he hoped) but still it broke his heart. He had his reasons. They were dangerous, not specifically towards others unless provoked, but that was likely to be any person. No, they were a danger to themselves and it was the virus. It existed in their minds, just on the surface, but that was just it: simply existing and nothing more. Everyone would die and Nathan was terrified. Absolutely terrified. That's why Nathan was after Peter. Like any good older brother Nathan was after him to protect him even if Nathan looked like the villain. Oh, but he was so desperate to keep Peter safe that there was no time and he was terrified of the proposition of that virus.

A crunch under his feet on pavement and his stomach churned. Nathan suddenly felt he was hunting Peter like some sort of animal out for its prey. Hardly the reasons he'd set out after Peter – and the others in the first place. Then when the predator captured his prey… Could he really just lock Peter away as he struggled in a cage against cold chains? Stuck in a wooden chair and Nathan would just have to stand there, waiting and watching. God, his heart was already breaking. Nathan felt sicker at the proposition then of doing that to the one person he cared the most about. Or else he'd be a lost and broken man. But Nathan was willing to sacrifice his sanity, his clean hands, and his love for his brother in order to save Peter's life. Peter might understand one day. Might.

Nathan never cared about all that mumbo jumbo about their destinies. He just looked at what was in front of him and it terrified him. But the torture wouldn't stop with the literal chains, the literal cage. There was that figurative one; the one Peter would really curse him for. _Lab rats_, crossed his mind, but they were hardly that, especially Peter. They just needed a cure to be healed. How Nathan sounded like some sick and twisted bastard… But there they would stay at the facility until a cure could be created.

"But what if you don't find a cure? What if you end up killing all of us instead? What then?" Peter's voice rang in Nathan's head. Peter would say that if he knew. But it was a risk Nathan was wiling to accept, to take if there was that slightest chance of saving his life.

They'd almost caught Peter, once when he raided an old storage locker of Noah's when Noah was with the Company. What Peter had taken now made him dangerous to others, but they were mere distractions for escape, mere tools for protection, and maybe to take back what was never anyone's to begin with. But now they had three, one angry, one dying, and one with the mind who could cure the virus away, so to speak. The process would happen slowly, much slower than before originally planned, but that was all right. They would be making progress. But they needed to capture _him_. Peter was one of the ringleaders, the one to bring everyone together, the one people looked to when looking for direction. When they were at their lowest, their beginning, the first time together after fleeing capture, Peter had told them what they needed to do. Nathan wasn't there, of course, but he'd grown up with Peter and knew the others and they way they were. Regardless of Peter being the non-leader type, the emotional type, the passionate one in the family, he'd still been endowed with the presence of a leader, more than the others at the very least. And when Peter was stripped away from them, the rest would have to fend for themselves, walk around like headless chickens. It was cruel, it was sad and Peter would hate Nathan more for it, but this was the best way. Some how Nathan knew then the capture would be a brutal one because no matter how gentle Peter first appeared, how he seemed to be, he cared and he was a fighter (regardless of saying that Peter wasn't before) and that's where Peter's strength came from.

Nathan rubbed his face with one hand, fingering the five o'clock shadow, looking ever looking around for some sort of answer. Only then Nathan rested his eyes on the mantle where a picture frame stood across the room. They'd almost caught Peter again tonight, but he'd fled, again. Nathan had gone home and just got in, tired and exhausted: that lost and broken man. And he was still breaking. A hand brushed Peter's face in the picture and Nathan wanted to pick it up, hold him up to his chest and whisper, "I'm sorry. I'm so sorry," but he didn't. Nathan swept himself away to shower and turn in for the night. Yet somehow Nathan knew he would be up anyway wondering and worrying.

The next day they'd shipped the two out to the facility, the dying already there on some god-forsaken island no one knew about but the government. It was underwater; partly, so even from above it was just some random plot of land with an actor's summer home on top. And Peter would be after them, and he'd broken in the Washington headquarters only to find the three gone. And no one knew where they had gone. The facility's location was kept secret. The mind reader was of no use and the people that did know where they were; the two were not there either. Cursing the mind reader thought to himself only if he could save the speedster. So they left, never taking a soul with them, inflicting wounds, but that was expected.

Nathan had left a message, cryptic and something only Peter would understand. And they would meet; alone because that's they way they did things, the way they had to respect each other. Or at least used to. Nathan new he was being watched, being followed and it was a dangerous situation, but Nathan loved Peter and wanted this whole charade to end as quickly as he had started it. The question then came down to faith. Would Peter believe in Nathan like Nathan had always done for Peter, in spite of of their stupid choices and failures? But Peter never showed. That park bench was silent and cold, lonely. Truly a lost and broken man for the one person Nathan cared about the most to abandon him, but Nathan wasn't the one who needed help. Why would Peter come, Nathan wondered. Peter was angry with Nathan and all those reasons Nathan gave him, "What I'm doing is hugely important for this country. For the world."

Nathan had pulled the card Peter always played "save the world" kind of deal, and Nathan thought it just might convince Peter, but what was he thinking? Nathan was never one to think and act towards goals like Peter would. Besides the fact that Nathan had literally disowned him… what had he done? Nathan had disowned him in more ways he could count and now he really became the villain. Forgiveness was beyond what could be done now. Those "better qualities" that Peter had described those attributes Nathan had listed were true, selfish and arrogant. Nathan thought he could do it and it was all for himself now because there was no turning back. He'd made his decision even if it broke his heart.


End file.
